? NOVEMBER 2020 ?
Going into November, we hit the rewind button from a couple months back and will finish this year out in a STRONG (see what we did there) way…Wendler-esque strength cycle #2! Now that we all have gone through that entire first cycle, after many athletes had been without strength training for quite some time, we feel like we’ve got our feet underneath us again in the terms of strength training. We will be testing, completing the cycle, de-loading and re-testing our 2RM in all three lifts again; Back Squat, Strict Press, Deadlift. Utilizing those turkey gains as we push our strength to new levels and re-test in early December. This week is where we start with baseline 2RM testing.
In the Metcon department of the programming, we will be seeing the third installment of the workouts that we plotted to include 3x this year. Those workouts include a crowd favorite, D.T. , and our personal and very own, “Cali-Bear”! We are also very excited for the reemergence of partner workouts on the weekends! They will be alternating flipping back and forth on Saturdays and Sundays. So grab your buds and hit up Saturday classes and open gyms for a new kinda push with your friends!
Since I got such good feedback from the article I posted last week I thought I’d include another this week. Here is one of my personal favorites Pat Sherwood and his list of ’21 Fitness Pitfalls to Avoid’ taken from the November 5th edition of the Morning Chalk Up.
The pitfalls:
- You’re doing too much
Do less, but do it better, Sherwood says. - Not enough intensity
Intensity leads to the “good stuff.” Too much volume – a link back to number one on the list – leads to less intense workouts. - Relative intensity
Everybody is different, and intensity is individual to a person’s physical and psychological tolerance. Don’t try to murder yourself with every workout. - Not taking rest days
Sherwood calls this the “evil cousin” of doing too much; every person needs time to decompress, both mentally and physically. Rest is critical for intensity. - You don’t respect the heavy days
Dedicate a day to heavy lifting, and give the lift the respect it deserves. Heavy days typically get rushed, Sherwood says, which leads into an evil trap of feeling like you’re not doing enough, because you aren’t seeing strength gains. - You haven’t mastered the basics
“Your air squat is not that great, but you want to add lots of load to it,” Sherwood explains. Don’t rush to advance before the fundamentals are rock solid. - You’re in need of some extra conditioning or gymnastics, but you decide to lift more
In the CrossFit hierarchy, metabolic conditioning and gymnastics come before weightlifting and throwing. It’s really easy to jump to weight lifting before you’ve nailed a foundation. - Cherry-picking
“There are so many wonderful things associated with variance,” Sherwood says. Cherry-picking workouts can lead to overtraining or bad recovery, because you’re wearing yourself down in one area. - You fear the 5K run
“Don’t fear this, it’s good for you, you won’t lose your gains,” Sherwood explains. - You aren’t sprinting enough
Those track days might sting, but Sherwood assures that sprinting is worth it, calling sprints “profoundly beneficial and critical.” - You’re not scaling frequently enough
“Scaling is cool, scaling is your friend, scaling leads you to becoming a monster beast of fitness,” Sherwood says. It goes back to intensity; scaling keeps you from feeling too bogged down with RX weights. - Not giving your midline enough attention
The midline is a critical piece of power transmission. It’s not a flashy thing to work on, but will pay huge dividends. - The improper warm-up
Sherwood lays out an example of a five-round workout: if you’re not feeling good until the end of the second round or beginning of the third, you’re probably not warming up enough. “Allow your body to walk into the workout actually prepared,” he says, “and things will most likely go better.” - The improper cool-down
This can negatively affect your training for the next day, or even week. - You haven’t mastered the strict movements
Always have a “little basket of strict movements” to back up your kip. - You’re not dedicating enough time to practice
“Regular practice leads to wonderful things,” Sherwood says. It’s another one of those non-sexy things and is easy to blow off, but practice is linked to mechanics, consistency, and more. - You’re impatient
Not all of the fitness will arrive today. It’s a long road. - Sleep
“Nothing is going to go well if you’re not getting the sleep you need,” Sherwood points out. - Diet
“Maybe, potentially, just maybe there’s just a little bit of room for improvement,” he says. - You link your performance in a workout to your worth
Sherwood gives the example of former competitive athletes, who transition out of having their world revolve around training. “If they start to see a decline from any lifetime PR,” he explains. “They don’t feel good.”
But, he points out, that this added stress and expectation makes the time at the gym less fun. “You’re just working out,” he continues, “It has nothing to do with if you are a good or bad person.” - You are comparing yourself unnecessarily
“You are just trying to be a better version of the you that you were yesterday, or last week, or six months ago,” Sherwood says. Unnecessary comparison might not be as motivating as you thought.
The bottom line: Sherwood is quick to disclaim that he has made a number of these mistakes, and he’s not here to tell anyone what they’ve done wrong in training.
- “I hope these are taken as a list of 21 things that I think will help people enjoy their time in the gym more, get on a track to faster, healthier, better long term fitness, avoid some pitfalls ” he says, concluding the video.
- “Plenty of these things are mistakes that I have personally made, beyond a shadow of a doubt, and if I can help somebody be a bit more efficient with their learning curve than I was, then that will make my day.”
Let’s finish the year STRONG CFD!!! Get some!
Announcements:
Construction
Pardon our dust. There are some small construction projects going on around the gym. We do not see a need to change our class schedule at all but as things change there may be a few messes. We’ll do our best to keep it to a minimum but want to give you all a heads up. Thanks for the understanding.
Here are the lifts of the week:
- Monday – BSQT
- Tuesday – Strict Press
- Wednesday – “Hansen”
- Thursday – Ring MuscleUps!
- Friday – Dubs n Deads ? (Deadlifts)
- Saturday – METCON
- Sunday – Open Gym
